


Cloud and Iron

by Angiestrangelittlecorner



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Or he was like in his house but they couldn't get past security, Sort Of, adrien is in shock, adrien loves her but needs her as a friend in that moment, adrinette at the end, basiiicallyyy, but it's kind of friendly i guess, dunno if there's even any real dialogue, gabriel get's arrested, he really just needs hugs tbh, heavily, i dunno don't think about it too much, it's a grey story, it's a very dull-ish fic, mentioned dialogue but it didn't feel appropriate for the way this is written, post-Final Battle, rip lmfao
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-17
Updated: 2020-04-17
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:07:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23707351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Angiestrangelittlecorner/pseuds/Angiestrangelittlecorner
Summary: The colours of the world had been dulled out – not black and white – but rather in shades of iron and cloud. It was not unpleasant, and it felt like closure, but it was not pleasant either. Adrien, his mind like bits of broken poetry, reached up without thought, his hand slowly coming to rest on the cold stone.-or (since I usually never do proper summaries)-After the storm, there was nothing.For Adrien, this was everything.
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir & Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
Kudos: 20





	Cloud and Iron

**Author's Note:**

> Soooo. Had this idea. In this fic, They're probably in their last year of highschool, or maybe first year of university/college. Honestly, I'd like to use the right french terms for their school years but my cousins have tried to explain it but y'all it makes NO SENSE.  
> Anyways so I have to design a collection (only 6 looks but honestly, that's worse because TOOOO MMANNYYY IDEEAASS) and submit it in three hours but i've been working on it for a week and a half and i'm too tired so i did this instead and wasted an hour. Whelp.  
> basically this takes place about five minutes after gabriel and co. are taken away and the reporters trickle away and Adrien just stands there, kind of out of it.  
> Hope this isn't too boring, because I tried to make it boring only enough to make you feel how he was feeling, which is so completely shocked and numb.

Adrien felt as if his whole world in that moment, was a whisper. It was like the silent hiss of steam from an iron, the slow blow of wind through trees just before it rained.

Silent, Adrien Agreste stood at the end of the long driveway, looking ahead, as if nothing had happened. The tall gates loomed beside him, tall and impassive; he was small against their size, though he felt in control – of them, but not of himself. An odd feeling, to be sure. Almost like floating through space for a long time: spinning slowly and laying back, staring into nothing, and wondering if it was everything.

The colours of the world had been dulled out – not black and white – but rather in shades of iron and cloud. It was not unpleasant, and it felt like closure, but it was not pleasant either. Adrien, his mind like bits of broken poetry, reached up without thought, his hand slowly coming to rest on the cold stone.

 _This will go_ , he decided, _this will go, and so will I. It's not my prison anymore._

He felt slow and sluggish as he hopped up to a lower pedestal, looking at his house for the first time since it had happened.

So big. Large. Massive. Ginormous. Substantial. Colossal. He almost smiled, though it would have been poison on his lips. _I know so many words. What a shame, Father, that you were never really proud of me for learning them. What a shame, that I would never have been enough. What a shame that you led me to believe I could._

He wanted to laugh, but the sound he would make was like acid in his ears, and the feeling passed.

He wondered, briefly, what he was doing. There was no one left. He was alone. His father, Nathalie…gone. The Gorilla would have taken Adrien with him, somewhere safe and warm, but Adrien would not know how to contact the dead.

Guilt slowly poured around his heart like ink spilling from its pot, thick and dark, sadly holding him with sympathy for the mess it would make when it reached the floor.

_Is there anyone left?_

Plagg was in his pocket, sleeping, as he had been for the whole of the day, and the one before it. Adrien wished he would wake, the emotionless state of shock he could not feel failing to take the dull ache of loneliness away. It had been with him so long; he had almost forgotten its presence.

_Is there anyone left?_

There was nothing conscious about his movements. The clouds began to darken the beautiful streets of Paris, and the promise of rain kept people from stopping him in the streets, though it would not have mattered, because he would not have stopped regardless.

If he had looked back, he would have noticed that police had joined a gathering crowd at his house, looking at it with fear and longing curiosity. They wanted to see inside, but they were also too afraid of what horrors they might find.

Adrien knew that they would find the emptiness he had felt daily. They would find tall walls and ceilings that looked impossibly gleeful, laughing at him still, though he was no longer there. The people that dared enter his home would find nothing great, and even less good. They would see a lack of warmth, a lack of love, a lack of _life_ , as though they had all died.

Adrien wondered if perhaps they had.

His feet stopped in front of The Bakery. It was the only one that mattered, to him anyways. Because she was there. There was always love in there, in a place that radiated warmth from the people who lived in it, rather than the ovens that burned steadily to greet him.

There was a place that he knew he would never want to leave, as long as there was life in him to live, and a heart that beat in his chest, and a mind that ran circles in his head. As long as he drew breath, he never wanted to leave that place: _her_. 

He was not sure how he had come inside, but he was there, and asking to see her. Sabine and Tom, so full of all the things he missed when he lost his mother, smiled sadly. They had heard the news, and other customers seemed to be shocked that it could be _him_. _Here_. _When his father is…_

Adrien saw her mother nod, and he was up the stairs, quickly, but without feeling. There was not any urge to get to her, but rather a need, the distinct awareness that if he did not get to her _now_ , he might be alone forever.

Outside, the harsh pitter-patter of heavy rainfall calmed him, lifting the dark from his grey world, and settling him back into his neutral range of light and what came in between.

Adrien felt tired in that moment before he opened the hatch in the ceiling. He stopped, thinking nothing, and everything, at once.

He suddenly realised that, for all his loneliness and all the times he felt alone, all the times that _day_ alone, that he said it, thought it…

It was true. It was finally true.

He whispered her name as he saw her, umbrella in hand, coat on, ready to go outside. The umbrella slipped from her hand, and he saw, even without looking, the name on the handle. He saw it as she blinked at him, and he saw it as clearly as he was seeing her, standing before him like nothing he had ever seen. He saw it as he rushed to her, arms gathering her to himself and feeling, finally, that he was not alone.

He saw that name, written prettily and perfectly on the handle of the umbrella. His father saw it, and it drove him to madness. Adrien saw it, and he felt the ghost of her love.

_Emilie Agreste._

Marinette, shocked at his being there at all, because of course she did not understand how he felt. He was an idiot to not tell her, but she was not only the closest thing to his heart – she was his friend, one of the best ones he could ever possibly have, and he would not lose that for the world. She wrapped her arms around his neck as they sank to the floor and he began to cry. Adrien held his eyes shut tightly; his body wracked with sobs.

He knew they were not sobs of grief.

This was relief.

_Relief_. 

**Author's Note:**

> The shades of grey Adrien references (also the title)are from this chart, if you feel confused: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/ce/91/79/ce917951b62bd45caafd8be7c7c72725.png
> 
> Also there's no reveal because we know that hawkmoth might not be the final villain, thanks to that beatboxing back in time chris akuma, so I feel like Thomas wouldn't give us the reveal until they were eighty five and marinette was boutta lose her memories cause guardian life really do be like that....   
> So yeah, i decided that there was no reveal, just gabriel going to jail, which, some say, is almost as happy to think about.


End file.
